


Unnatural Acts Are Only Natural, After All

by Predatrix



Category: Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell (TV), Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell - Susanna Clarke
Genre: Dream Sex, Hand Jobs, Intercrural Sex, M/M, Norrell Really Really (Really) Wants a Shag, Norrell Really Really (Really) Wants to Apologise, Spanking
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-31
Updated: 2015-07-31
Packaged: 2018-04-12 06:29:58
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 9,914
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4468826
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Predatrix/pseuds/Predatrix
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>(Title is from Discworld's only reference to LGBTQ matters, where the Seamstresses' Guild vote to disallow Mr Harris (of the Blue Cat Club) but Mrs Palm argues for tolerance)</p><p>This idea started when I read neveralarch's <i>I Reached Out My Hand</i> and wanted to do my own story where Norrell bites. So I PM'd her and she said I could--and then I wrote a story in which Norrell doesn't bite, not even once (oops). My characterisation of him biting out of 'petty uncivilised greed' is all over it, though.</p><p>Also, even though it's filthy, it has feetnotes.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

John Childermass had set his considerable mind to a few trades. At pickpocketing, he had a natural hand, a light touch, but growing up was the problem: a lanky man at least half-a-head taller than the mark was going to show up, especially to busybodies giving chase. Day-labour didn’t pay well, and most of the time the work got him nowhere. He would certainly have had the wits for teaching, but he had neither the patience nor the money to give him a start in the life. Indeed, it was wonderful how often someone _wanting_ money had to bait their own hook with money!

Domestic service, then. He could start low, and aim higher. And people were always wanted for that.

After a few rather annoying months, he decided that apparently what they wanted were tactful people. Humble people. People who would do every thing that was needed without ever mentioning it, and keep their tongues behind their teeth if they noticed any thing ridiculous, or inefficient, or unfair. Why, it was as if folk would sooner think their way was best than learn how it might be improved.

And there was one place in Yorkshire that could barely hold onto servants beyond a few months, if that, and that people often mentioned in low voices, as a Horrible Example. He’d talked to some of the folk who came away from there: the Scots cook who said it was a ‘gey unchancy business’ and refused to say any more; the once-brash footman who turned white at the mere mention of a daffodil; the tween-stairs maid who had been shouted-at for lighting a fire. And all of them had stories of the master there. His requirements seemed to change by the day, by the minute. He wanted his servants to know their letters in case they threw away the wrong papers but flew into a rage if any of them _picked up_ the papers to check. He was equally afraid of moving out of his unfashionable country mode of dress and of being found out to be unfashionable. He went into a passion if any of his food or drink was too cold or too hot, but hardly ever remembered to eat or drink it in a timely fashion.

Childermass decided to give the idea of domestic service one last month. If nothing else, he’d have the tale to tell, after. And he would take absolutely no pains in correct behaviour: whatever happened would surely be the master’s fault, whatever happened.

He wasn’t surprised that he could do none of a valet’s useful tasks to the satisfaction of Mr Norrell, from putting on his boots, to shaving him, to tying a cravat. His master didn’t really seem to like people, and was fussy about just about every thing else, as well.

The first real surprize was the library. It was so fine and large that he was surprised that none of the servants who told tales about Mr Norrell had mentioned it. In fact, he thought there was some sort of joke about it on his first day, from the sniggering of the other servants when they told him to try going to the library. Childermass thanked his luck for the odd sense of place that had never steered him wrong yet, half-closed his eyes, and set off. He’d rarely missed his way searching for a place, or an object, as long as he needed to find it, and was taking care not to look with his normal daylight attention but some sort of ‘uncommon sense’. It was inexplicable, but useful enough to have.

“What are you doing here!” exclaimed Mr Norrell, and continued, “…since you _are_ here, you can pass me the Belasis.”

Childermass half-closed his eyes again, turned, and unhesitatingly went up a ladder and laid his hand on the very book, without so much as glancing at its spine. He came back and handed it over.

Mr Norrell’s eyebrows shot up, and he muttered something about Childermass “maybe not being as hopeless as the usual run of servants around here.” Then he spent all afternoon making Childermass open his mouth, and his eyes, and be turned round. After that, he seemed very pleased, exclaiming, “Not so much as to be dangerous, nor so little as to be useless!”[1](%E2%80%9C#foot1%E2%80%9D)

Rather to his own surprise, Childermass started to get somewhat attached to the library, and the magician within it. His notional month passed quickly, without his noticing it, and he stayed. It was here, in what he regarded as his home, Mr Norrell let go of some of the complaining, awkward, fussy ways for which he was known, and looked somewhat nearer to his actual age2. He also shewed a few of his arts as a magician. When Childermass discovered there was one book too well-warded for his talent to take him straight to it, Mr Norrell cast a spell that made the book’s spine shine so that he could find it straight-away. There was a spell for cleaning spider-webs off the library, which worked very well except that Childermass had to go round the library for spiders first, because what if they started trotting about once their webs were missing, and Mr Norrell wasn’t going to risk that for _anything,_ powerful magician or not. And when Childermass caught a severe chill riding out in the rain, and was trying hard not to sneeze near the books, Mr Norrell cast a spell that was almost painfully strong in the way it prickled in his stuffed nose, but _did_ manage to get rid of the symptoms in a few minutes. Childermass wasn’t entirely grateful: since Mr Norrell then discovered a problem with the spell that the illness would rebound upon the caster, this meant _Mr Norrell_ now had a severe chill, and the fussing-about that went with that was about three times the trouble that Childermass would have had getting through his own illness.

But Childermass appreciated competence, even if oddly-expressed, and was beginning to get a feel for magic. He could tell how strong a spell was, after a time, and he liked the way the excitement of magic lit Mr Norrell all up from within. The piquant contrast of Mr Norrell’s considerable skill with his equally-considerable fussy helplessness gave Childermass an odd feeling of admiration, irritation and protectiveness in about equal parts.

 

Mr Norrell liked to be taken care of, although he would rarely admit it.

On one particular occasion, when Childermass had been away for two days, he returned to find his master in very bad case. By the accounts of the other servants, Norrell had taken no meals all that time, but remained shut up in his library, where he was found faint, too starved with cold and hunger to do any thing. _Like a baby bird fallen out of the nest,_ Childermass thought with exasperated tenderness, and he found the most expeditious way to handle the crisis was to sit his master on his lap and slowly spoon warm sweetened gruel into his mouth until he was comfortable enough to sleep. After that Childermass gave him a firm pronouncement that he had to take care of himself, at least enough to take one proper meal a day. Norrell bristled up: "It is the outside of enough, Childermass, that you should presume to dictate terms to me on managing my own life!” But after a while, Childermass noticed that there was a new spell in the library: if Mr Norrell had been over-working and missing meals, a melodious peal of bells would sound, and, if ignored, get louder and louder. Trust Mr Norrell to perform a spell where another gentleman would simply have recourse to servants or merely a sense of practicality, but it worked, or at least Childermass didn't find himself called-upon to hand-feed Mr Norrell again.

Sometimes Norrell liked to have a warm bath drawn for him, and because he was terrified of getting his books wet, he'd lie there and have Childermass read to him from across the room at a safe distance, from time to time telling him how he liked his voice, even if it was Yorkshire and ill-educated. Childermass, who wasn't over-sensitive about his accent, or his education, and found Mr Norrell’s ignorance of his own less-marked local accent funny, didn't mind very much. Besides, he enjoyed the view. Norrell looked the scholar he was, a rather endearing mixture of too-lean and too-pudgy from too many meals substituted by biscuits and too little exercise. To a man who liked the occasional evidence of human frailty in his employer, it was a pleasant sight.

Mr Norrell seemed to have relatively little common sense. When he took a chill, he sometimes had the habit of trying to push through it, ignoring his illness in the interests of scholarship, until he was almost ready to cast up his accounts, and any thing more like a very small moulting vulture than Mr Norrell trying not to feel sick Childermass had not seen on this earth. Childermass had rubbed his cold hands, and wiped his brow, until he felt better, and simply explained to him that he must not vomit in the library, until Mr Norrell learned to only read his book for about ten minutes when he took a chill, before stopping to sit far away from dangerous contact with the books, and sip the hot toddy Childermass made him, and rest his feet in the warm foot-bath, and complain, and get the shivers, until Childermass firmly told him to be still.

 

He often wondered, later, which of them had initiated his change in circumstances with Gilbert Norrell. To the best of his recollection, it had just happened, although perhaps Mr Norrell’s inhibitions had been somewhat loosened by some of Childermass’s more personal services.

As most of the time when his master was at all comfortable, they were in the library. Norrell had been in a chair with his nose in a new book that he had, as rarely, gone to collect himself, to make sure it was the third edition with the revisions. Childermass was preparing to take Norrell’s boots off. Absent-mindedly, he was resting a hand on his master’s thigh, wondering how the man managed to function at all, he was so knotted-up and tightly-strung, but a certain warmth and quivering feeling alerted him to the way his hand (large compared to Norrell’s dainty one) had strayed a little too far. Too high up on the leg. He froze, wondering how much trouble he was in, and noticed Norrell, blushing, giving a hissing breath, and opening his thighs infinitesimally. Norrell didn’t look as if his attention was quite on scholarship, for once.

Childermass nearly said something, which would probably3 have ruined the whole thing. Norrell looked scared to death, and Childermass knew enough to realise that his master would often spit out something spiteful and run away if he was afraid. Which was a fair bit of the time.

Instead, Childermass put his hand down in Norrell’s lap, where it looked large against Norrell’s daintiness, and just _pressed_ on him. Norrell whimpered quietly. Childermass looked at the expression on Norrell’s face, a look of greed he had only rarely seen in contexts not involving a rare book. Norrell was biting his own lip, apparently in an attempt to keep silent.

In an attempt to move matters on, Childermass lifted his hand and fumbled with the front fall of Norrell’s breeches. Norrell snarled under his breath. It didn’t sound an entirely happy sound. Then he snapped “If I need you to undress me I shall tell you so!”

But the tension of the situation had done nothing to ameliorate the tightness in Mr Norrell’s breeches, although why he should frustrate his own inclinations Childermass did not know. In want of a better idea, he returned to what he’d already been doing, pressing firmly. Norrell squirmed, but not, apparently, to get away.

Childermass elaborated the pressure with a little rocking and grinding. After a couple of minutes, Norrell hissed, “yes!” between his teeth, so Childermass kept working him; more rocking and grinding, harder. Norrell gasped, “nearly!”, and Childermass went as hard as he could, until Norrell gave a shuddering groan that left nothing to the imagination and fell slowly, blissfully limp.

Childermass turned away, and gave his master a few minutes to get his wits together. Not hearing anything, he looked round.

Norrell was fast asleep in his chair, drooling slightly, and his wig had fallen off. Sighing, Childermass tidied and cleaned his master up, and went to his room to take care of his own needs.

 

It could not be said that the experience had softened his master’s temper.

Childermass spent the entire next morning convinced he would be turned off without a character, naught the better for this job but a half-worn pair of boots (an improvement on the network of holes he had previously been sporting). He hadn’t even stayed long enough to acquire a thick winter greatcoat, which would probably be useful wherever he ended up4.

Mr Norrell had fostered this belief by filing his tongue to a sharper point than ever before and stropping it on every body within reach (usually Childermass).

Not that his complaints had anything to do with the unprecedented events of the previous day. Oh no. That would have been too simple. Instead, Childermass had forgotten to bring him breakfast when he forgot to ring for it because he was fossicking about in books again5. Childermass had forgotten, or to tell the truth never been asked, to go to the tailor's for a new dress-coat when Mr Norrell had tried ironing it with a spell and burnt right through it (which was the laundry-maid's fault, it shouldn't have been there in the first place); Childermass had misfiled _Secret Artes and Poweres of Memory_ 6; there was a book forty miles away and he was far too busy to go and fetch it, why hadn’t Childermass? And he glared more and more nastily.

Childermass eventually decided that, rather than being sent away, he was being obliquely required to perform that last task. “I need a good coat, if I’m to ride in winter,”

Norrell looked slightly less sour, and gave him a note-of-hand and the direction of his tailor.

“It’s a wonder nobody fleeces you blind, master,” said Childermass, noticing the amount was not filled in. He realised as soon as he’d said it that it was just the kind of too-honest remark that had lost him a few situations.

“If you prove profligate, I can always send you away later,” said Norrell. “In general, as long as you shew respect for my books, and a modicum of intelligence, I care little about any other thing.”7

Childermass smiled, slowly. He had given up hope of finding a position where his sharp tongue, sly looks, and insolent demeanour, were found at all convenient. Maybe here his nature would be accepted as long as it went along with a cunning mind and plentiful abilities. Norrell might shew a few signs of ‘putting the servants in their place’, but he could probably manage that by the simple expedient of making himself indispensable, and otherwise keeping out of the way when Norrell was in one of his more pettish humours.

He succeeded to admiration in this, and to his delight, adding to his growing warmer feelings for his inconvenient employer, he found that as long as the two of them were alone, he could say whatever he liked, even as far as teasing or mocking Norrell a little, and pointing out all sorts of ways in which the business of the house could be improved. Since these were precisely the sorts of things he’d got in trouble for saying, or felt the want of saying, previously, he felt better in charity with this master than any other.

 

He had almost forgotten the intimacy, if it was intimacy, they had shared. It hardly seemed like to happen again, knowing Mr Norrell’s nervous habits and fear of difficult situations…until it did, a few weeks later.

This time, Childermass was leaning over his master to help make sense of a large Magical Mappe of Englonde (complete with a positively-ridiculous quantity of forests and mountains, according to his employer) when Mr Norrell had a violent fit of shivers. When his master stayed still and did not call for his usual hot toddy when he was developing a chill, but pressed back against him, Childermass had a shrewd idea what the matter was. Having learned from the previous occasion, Childermass merely held his position and waited for his master to decide what, if anything, to do.

Norrell rubbed his rump backwards in Childermass’ lap, moaning very slightly, and snapped, “Make yourself useful and loosen my clothing!” 

“What am I, your slave?” muttered Childermass, sotto voce.

Mr Norrell’s ears were apparently sharp enough to pick that up. “Not a very good one, then,” he said, slapping Childermass’s hands away from their attempt to undo his breeches entirely.

“Meanin’ I can’t read your mind? It’s a reasonable ’ypothesis from the way you’re wriggling,” said Childermass irritably.

Mr Norrell managed, with the use of a number of periphrases and circumlocutions, somehow to convey that he had a horror of buggery, as he could not imagine it to be possible without causing pain.

“If it hurts, you’re doin’ it wrong,” said Childermass. “But I can get us comfortable like this if that’s what you’re after.” This time, as he reached unerringly for the front fall of Norrell’s breeches, he heard no response more verbal than a moan of relief, followed, after a few minutes’ wriggling, by, “No, we can’t, we’ve got to keep the Map safe!” If he’d managed to get Norrell randy enough to forget about written materials for a whole five minutes, that was something, he decided.

He got up and set the room to rights, making sure the Map, and every vestige of the written word, was safely tucked away, and the door was locked. He admired the sight of his master so lost in lechery that his eyeglasses were askew and his tongue-tip protruding a little.

Without opening his eyes, Mr Norrell snapped, “Childermass, what are you about!”

“About to give your cock a nice, tight pleasuring with my fist,” Childermass murmured, right into his ear.

From the little jump back Norrell gave, he hadn’t expected Childermass to be back in position so soon, but that gave Childermass the chance to keep rubbing his own crotch eagerly against his employer’s warm bum as he delivered said pleasuring. For himself, he blessed Norrell’s tendency to parsimony and lack of fashion with clothing: both pairs of breeches were comfortably warm and soft enough to do the trick, and he spent before he could even think to hold back: too long at his duties had evidently left him somewhat eager.

The threat of being left unsatisfied was evidently enough to drive his master wild, as he could manage nothing more than a series of incoherent pleas begging him _please_ not to stop, just a _bit_ more, just a _little_ … and then that shameless, magnificently-satisfied groan again, and his hand was soaked.

He was not particularly surprized to find Norrell asleep again, on the desk this time, and peeled him up to get him to bed. Once in the bedroom, he’d have liked to stay, and look at the expression on Norrell’s face for a bit, but he had work to do, so he tucked the man up in bed (feeling an odd impulse, which he quashed, to kiss his cheek), and got about his business.

 

He took to marking in his journal with an X the days when he had relations with Norrell (around every three weeks or so). If he had a clew when his master was likely to start getting a bit needy, he could feel him out with a bit of impertinent flirtation when they were alone, to judge what was wanted.

Normally, for example, people who asked Mr Norrell what he wanted for breakfast got a Why Are You Plaguing Me expression, if nothing worse8. One day, after returning from travel, Childermass totted up the days to around four weeks, and decided that Norrell might very well be in the mood. So he went to the library, where Norrell was ignoring the very idea of breakfast as usual, came up close behind him and murmured, insinuatingly, “Fancy a bit of tongue, sir?” Norrell snapped, “what the d—-l do you mean by that, sir?” quite as if in outraged modesty, but shivered all over.

“Merely asking what you’re after…for your breakfast. Sir,” said Childermass, leaving a long pause before the ‘sir’ to make the point that he needn’t have said it at all.

Norrell said something horrible about Childermass’s brains, antecedents and general uselessness. It didn’t put him out in the slightest, since he was confident in his intelligence and abilities, and thought that his parents had nothing to say to anything. But since Norrell had better not be let get away with that, he muttered, “If you weren’t gentry….”

“What?” snapped Norrell.

"I should have tekken thee over my knee for being a whining brat long ago, be the making of thee!"

“If you _must_ be uncivilised,” said Norrell, shivering and blushing even more. “Can I…” He mumbled something. Meaning he wanted something and thought it would be _particularly_ filthy to say it.

Childermass put his arms out obligingly. “Go on…whisper it.”

Norrell nestled up to him, positively scarlet. “Can I get it between your nice strong thighs while you warm my arse for me?” He moaned. “I’m ready to spend just thinking of it.”

So Childermass got both of their breeches untied and pushed-down, and gave him what he wanted. _“Now_ who’s uncivilised? Sir,” he said, as he worked up a rhythm and Norrell prodded between his legs with greedy little thrusts. “I bet you’ve been fit to burst for the last week, as well. Good thing you’ve got me here to take care of you.” He stroked his master’s hot, roughened arse, and favoured it with a positive fusillade of slaps.

Norrell couldn’t manage anything more coherent than choked swearing and frantic, shuddering spasms. Unusually, he cuddled up afterwards. “Anything you want,” he offered, yawning. “Except sodomy.” He yawned again. So Childermass, feeling he couldn’t in conscience take advantage of somebody so exhausted, finished himself off, as usual, except it was certainly _not_ usual to be watched by Norrell, however sleepy-eyed. Not only that: Norrell reached out to fondle his thighs and balls as he finished.

“I wish…” said Norrell, after that. Childermass paused, but nothing else was forthcoming, as Norrell yawned again, and did go to sleep. He was disappointed, but far from surprized, when Norrell was impressively vile to him the next day, sent him off in search of a book that didn’t exist (as far as he could tell), complained about his not finding the non-existent book, and sacked three housemaids for incompetence.

Childermass suspected that the only reason Mr Norrell kept more than a bare minimum household was to have people to throw out when he was in a bad humour. After a while, he suggested that although it was completely understandable that Mr Norrell was frustrated by incompetence, it would waste far less of his time if he didn’t have to spend so much of it throwing people out. He could perfectly well have somebody else to do it. Mr Norrell agreed this was a reasonable way of doing things.

After that, by tacit agreement, Mr Norrell left the general management of the household to Childermass, who did his best to make sure his master wasn’t interrupted by petty details. Norrell still sacked people at least some of the time, but at least they now knew to come to Childermass to find if they were _actually really_ sacked or just had to keep a judicious distance from Mr Norrell until he forgot about it.

 

 

[1](%E2%80%9C#foot1t%E2%80%9D) It was only a few months later that Childermass realised that his odd ‘luck’ in finding was a trace of magic, and the fact that it was, at first glance, not enough to threaten Norrell, but enough to be useful, was possibly the first decisive factor in his success at his position—meaning that he would not be let go before Mr Norrell found out how useful he was.

[2](%E2%80%9C#foot2t%E2%80%9D) Whatever it was.

[3](%E2%80%9C#foot3t%E2%80%9D) Certainly.

[4](%E2%80%9C#foot4t%E2%80%9D)In England, anyway. Some of the people he’d happened across had wished him to a warmer place.

[5](%E2%80%9C#foot5t%E2%80%9D)Mr Norrell had apparently forgotten that nobody brought him unsolicited breakfasts any more, even if they knew where the library was. In his opinion, people should _know_ when he needed distraction or when he detested it.

[ 6](%E2%80%9C#foot6t%E2%80%9D)Norrell had merely forgotten where he’d left it, which could only argue for its usefulness.

[7](%E2%80%9C#foot7t%E2%80%9D) This was one of those things Norrell said that was only intermittently true. Conveniently for Childermass, if somebody made himself indispensable and gradually revealed he had a most un-servant-like turn of mind, it was true enough. The rest of the staff lived in a constantly-increasing state of nerves as Norrell revealed himself alternately caring and not-caring for the most petty of concerns.

[8](%E2%80%9C#foot8t%E2%80%9D) Things Mr Norrell had thrown at people in the past few years: a newspaper, a chamber-pot (clean), a crumpled-up linen-stock, his third-best wig, an ink-pot, a plateful of eggs, a pencil, one of his shoes. Things Mr Norrell had not thrown at people in the past few years: a book. The best one could say for him was that the heavier the object he threw, the less accurate he was, and he never seemed to be trying to hurt people as much as express his irritation.


	2. Chapter 2

"Don't wake up, John!" That was an unlikely start. So was the fact that Gilbert Norrell was standing beside his bed in a rather crumpled nightshirt, and not departed for Parts Unknown in a Pillar of Eternal Darkness. “If you wake up it’ll send me away again, and it was difficult enough getting here.”

“How _did_ you get here?” said Childermass, reserving judgement as to where they were except that it certainly looked like his own bedroom.

Norrell tried fruitlessly to restore his nightshirt to some sort of order. “I asked,” he said shortly.

"I'm the answer to your prayers, then?" Childermass grinned at the sheer ridiculousness of the situation.

"I spoke to...a personage," Norrell said irritably. "Well, not to say spoke, it was more like, complained in general. And, to be honest, there were a few tears."

Knowing his ex-master's gift for grudging understatement, Childermass had no doubt that Norrell had changed a fair amount, and had been a deal more emotional than...ever, probably.

"You spoke to Strange?” he guessed. But that couldn't be right; if Strange had managed to undo the Darkness, he would certainly have freed Norrell as well as himself, before rushing off in search of Arabella, but Childermass would have heard something that decisive. It would have rung the sky of England like a bell.

"No, and why would I be talking to you that way about someone I see every day—all night,” he corrected himself. “Are you as totty-headed as the servants I had before you, because I remember you being a _little_ cleverer!"

"You've not been doing...fairy-magic again?" Childermass inquired, with deep suspicion.

"I learned my lesson after the first time," Norrell admitted quietly. Far less defensive than he’d ever been before.

"That's not how I remember it,” said Childermass, not wanting Norrell to get away with his usual habit of presenting himself to better advantage than he deserved.

"If you _insist,_ I knew it was wrong when I did it." Honesty looked well on him, compared to that rat-in-a-trap expression when he'd found himself in a hole of his own making, and kept digging for years. “Then my head was quite turned, although I can only truly blame my own vanity, and I pretended to myself that I’d only done what was necessary for English Magic.”

Childermass nodded. That did agree better with what he remembered.

"Anyway, it wasn't quite speaking. I was...upset," Norrell continued. "I wanted to have...to have had, a different life, not the one I had. I wanted to have _been_ different! I wanted to make things better, not worse. I wanted to have been someone better. And it hurt. I had done so much to be defended, but it still hurt.”

"You took a wrong turn, in London. You weren't so bad before that."

“And to my shame, ‘not so bad as the worst I could be’ is hardly much of a recommendation.” He sighed, and rested his hand on the bed. He did look truly ashamed, which was a look Childermass had never seen on him before.

Childermass reached out, rubbing Norrell’s thumb gently.

Norrell went on: ”That person...told me that my feelings were making such an infernal noise he could hear me across Hell's deeps. Literally. I said it had taken me years (time's different there) to find what was left of my heart, and he could oblige me by killing me sooner than I would bury it again.”

This was not the Gilbert Norrell Childermass remembered, frightened to death of death[1](%E2%80%9C#foot1%E2%80%9D). 

“He...said he would not kill me, nor set me free, but there was one place the worlds could flow close together without regard for time and distance, and that was dreaming. He could let me enter the dreams of someone, somewhere I had unfinished business.”

"And it's me, then."

"It could never have been anyone else,” Norrell said, quite seriously.

“You sent me away.” It didn’t hurt Childermass now, as much as it had caught him on the raw at the time, but there was still a sting to the thought.

“Believe me, _that_ is one thing I came back to say I am sorry for. I lost my way. I was not faithful to my nature as a magician, nor to what I feel for you.” Although Norrell was looking down at his feet rather than facing Childermass, Childermass rather thought he meant it.

“Aye? And you let me know I was not your friend.” Childermass remembered the things he’d done that went above and beyond what a servant owed to his master. He hadn’t grudged them at the time, knowing how prickly and frightened Norrell was, and how happy he looked when Childermass had done something to soothe him, but having it thrown in his teeth that all of it meant precisely nothing had hurt.

“‘Friend’ is too small a word. You were my, my only… ‘Factotum’ might be a long enough word, if you remember it contains everything.”2 Norrell looked frightened, as if he thought somebody was going to laugh at him3. He swallowed. “You looked after me as a magician, but you even looked after the parts of me that had all but withered with neglect.”

“Ah.” Childermass slanted Norrell his long, sideways grin, not meaning it entirely friendly. “Now we come to it. You’re after a bit of a tumble, as I can’t reckon Strange is the type to sort you out.”

Maybe Norrell’s character had developed somewhat. Instead of an indignant flurry of recriminations, Childermass got an amused agreement that Strange’s tastes ran exclusively in the feminine way, a half-guilty grin (probably because the nightgown didn’t do much to conceal Norrell’s interest in the thought), and, “I certainly wouldn’t have said no, but that’s not what I’m here for.” 

“What is it, then?”

“I told…that person, that what I grieved most was what I had _not_ said and done. Jonathan Strange taught me, in the Darkness, how to become his friend, which eased my heart somewhat. I apologised to him for destroying his book—that I should ever have lost my way enough to destroy books! And I gave him a gift, we worked together on a spell for looking into water and talking to a friend, so he could see his…his wife.” He gave a small, pained sigh “All of it made me think about friendship. Then I saw how you had had my true interests at heart, and wanted me to become better than I was. I saw how you moved for my comfort, and for my knowledge, and my betterment, every day you were in my employment—and I saw how little I had considered you in only thinking of your pay. I also saw how Henry Lascelles and Christopher Drawlight were passing false coin in the way of friendship, wanting me to puff up into a false, grand, self-opinionated _windbag_ who would never do the slightest spell except for their consequence or my own. I had, I suppose, ‘buried my heart’—not that I’ve ever been that well-acquainted with it—perhaps because I had a wrong idea about gentlemen.”

“You thought they were always better. Even though if you’d troubled to use your eyes and ears, you could have found out otherwise.” Childermass could not remember a time when he’d thought that gentlemen were a better sort of man than anybody else, although he did not often think _anybody_ was a better sort of man than anybody else—nor was he often proved wrong.

Norrell nodded sadly. “But there was a difference, there in the other place. With the spell we worked on, Mr Strange could look into water and see Arabella, and they could _miss_ each other, and I had spent so long afraid to live my own life, I had no person to mourn, nor to mourn me, and… it wasn’t _fair,_ even if it _was_ my fault!”

Norrell in a passion could make his feelings felt rather thoroughly, and maybe that… other person had found him truly deafening on the psychic level.

Nothing happened for a few minutes. Childermass began to wonder if a person (or two people) could get bored in a dream, and what they would do to get out of it.

"Why am I still here?" Norrell sounded almost indignant. "I've said what I needed to say."

"Judging by you standing there, all of a fluster, with your prick nearly pushing out of your nightshirt, you’re up for a bit of attention.” Childermass looked at Norrell, slowly, rudely. "As to whether I _should,_ I doubt you deserve it."

"I kept my lower impulses to as few as possible! And you had a job to do, for me. Usually several. More important than my…carnal appetites. Which I shouldn’t have had in the first place.”

"You could barely bring yourself to go near me,” said Childermass. He’d certainly (luckily) taken a good deal of pleasure at having all that vulnerability in his hand, at being the only person Norrell had ever trusted with himself as a man. But he could hardly have missed the distinct lack of reciprocation.

“No! That is not what I meant, at all. That is not it, at all."4 Childermass’s heart warmed a little: that tone of irritable confusion at Norrell’s interlocutor not reading his mind was so familiar.

“You pushed me away. Several times,” said Childermass. “And you were downright vicious the day after the first time.” _And some of the other days,_ he thought. The only certain thing about Mr Norrell’s temper was that it was uncertain.

“Because you weren’t there!” Norrell snapped.

“You didn’t ask,” said Childermass, with heavy patience.

“I’m sorry,” said Norrell rather helplessly. “I didn’t want to have to,” he whispered. Childermass imagined him, rolling over all sleepy and towsled in the morning, ready for another go. He rather wished one or other of them to have had the confidence to manage it: a few more bouts to keep his master comfortable rather than on the edge of his nerves could have done wonders for Norrell’s disposition, and he wouldn’t have minded it himself5. But by the time he’d been there long enough to have a sense of how far he could push, Norrell and he had settled into their habits already. He’d just put it down to gentry having odd whims.

“Could have been anyone,” Childermass said, rather aggrieved. “You can’t put your boots on, can’t dress yourself, and can’t chase a mouse out of the room—small wonder you couldn’t frig yourself either!”

Norrell sat down on the bed rather abruptly. “How did you _know!”_ he exclaimed, before jumping up as if he rather regretted mentioning it at all.

“How did I know what?”

“I cast a spell. About the only useful one I found in Wykeston6.”

Childermass looked at him. “I didn’t reckon as it was a book you’d have recourse to,” he suggested cautiously.

“Only to cast a spell not to…touch myself. I was seventeen! It was getting in the way of my work! And it simplified things so wonderfully not to be so interested,” he added. “I think I might have done it even if I’d realised at the time it was shoddy workmanship and didn’t include a way to dissolve it.”

That explained a great deal. If Norrell didn’t take himself in hand in the way of ordinary men, no wonder he was half-mad with it if someone else offered him relief, and then fell into a deep sleep. And if he’d been avoiding even _thinking_ about it, no wonder he couldn’t manage to be straightforwardly grateful when somebody else made the decision for him and made him comfortable. By the time the sun set on the day after, Mr Norrell would have twisted it all round in his own head to say that his dirty, low servant had been importuning him and ruining the modest habits he’d effortlessly kept for so many years.

“Did it make you not touch other people, too?” Childermass asked him.

“I just…” Norrell’s mouth worked, and he blinked his small eyes. “I just _didn’t know how!”_ he almost wailed.

“So? You could have learned.” It wasn’t as though Norrell found learning antipathetic, after all.

“And I should very much like to know how you think I would have learned such a thing!” snapped Norrell.

“Why, from books, like every thing else you found out.”

“I have made myself universally detested among the booksellers of York and most points South7. I’m sure they’d like to be able to gossip to the effect that I am not merely committing….unnatural practices, but need a book explaining about how to _practice_ them!” He blushed again. Childermass appreciated how the blush went all the way down to his nightshirt.

“You could have used Wykeston again,” said Childermass.

“If I had wanted to draw some unwilling, and no doubt perfectly dull, _fool_ into my bed, it would have served me admirably,” said Norrell sharply. “It doesn’t offer the basics of the physical act, because it assumes the magician will have got that far on his own!”

Childermass smiled, with more warmth that time. “I think that’s the kindest thing you ever said about me in that way. Not dull, not a fool, and willing. Happen it was true enough.”

Norrell shrugged fussily, in the way that Childermass knew meant he felt a little exposed by coming out with such an un-magicianly sentiment as a compliment8, but could hardly find it in himself to deny it.

“I’d like it if you’d wanted me in particular,” said Childermass, “but I can manage.” 

“I always assumed you must have noticed,” Norrell said quietly. “After all, you knew every thing else that went on. I thought you knew when I liked it when you leaned over me, no one else came that close. When I let you say things to me nobody else could get away with. When I looked at you too often, particularly your hands, and your mouth, and your legs.”

He looked as if he were nerving himself up to something: “When you came back from travelling, and I was so excited by the thought of your muscular thighs that I made you chastise me like an errant schoolboy while I disgraced myself all over you, which was frankly hardly befitting my status as a respectable gentleman…”

“Wait,” said Childermass. "You _made_ me wallop you?” He chuckled. “As I recall it, you asked me. You weren't so delicate in your language, either, for all you were so embarrassed you could barely whisper it.”

Norrell sniffed. “That's as may be. But I was your employer, you would not have found it easy to go against my wishes.”

Childermass nearly howled with laughter.

“Oh, very well,” said Norrell, “I do recall you were quite the managing sort.”

“Never against your interests,” said Childermass. “But anything I really minded, I could have set my face against it without too much trouble. Not that you weren’t a selfish bugger,” he added.

“I wasn’t…” said Norrell, and apparently came up smack against reality, because he muttered, ”I suppose I _was,_ but it was nerves.”

“Which, since you didn’t tell me, came across as ‘selfish bugger’,” said Childermass. “You never even got as far as asking me what I liked, let alone providing it.”

"Oh, what good would it have done?" said Norrell. "You know I'm most unhandy at anything more demanding than turning the pages of a book. What chance would there be that anyone...with any basis for comparison would find me at all to their taste?"

Childermass was a little surprized: under the mountain of egoism and lack of regard for anyone else's interests, it turned out Mr Norrell was as shy as any one when the conversation could be turned from magic. It was just almost impossible to keep him off his favourite subject most of the time. "Does that mean you're asking me now?” he suggested.

Norrell looked at his feet again.

“So we’ve done a fair bit of fumbling at you, or at least I have,” said Childermass, “although I wish I’d had the chance to take your clothes off.”

Norrell fidgeted, pulling at his sleeve with one hand and crumpling it in his fist nervously.

“And I wish I’d had the chance to pull you into bed and be _properly_ improper,” said Childermass, who had found that particular imagining a reliable standby for when Norrell had fallen asleep immediately he’d had his pleasure, as usual.

Norrell mumbled something.

“Mm?”

“I was wondering…” Norrell was blushing and squirming again. “…what _you_ wear to bed.”

“Oh that’s an easy thing to answer,” said Childermass, “because the answer is nothing at all. So if you’d ever taken everything off, you could have just rubbed yourself all over me, nice and hot, without anything getting in the way.”

Norrell pulled his nightshirt over his head, crumpled it up and threw it into the corner, and then stood slightly hunched-over, with an expression as if to say such an act of daring had taken every ounce of courage he possessed and he was not at all sure what to do next. The blush went quite a long way down.

Accommodatingly, Childermass pushed the bedclothes off to show he was indeed wearing nothing at all. He opened his arms. “Come on, then,” and Norrell awkwardly scrambled up to his side and asked for blankets, digging his chin into Childermass’ shoulder in what was either an attempt to hide his face or a demand or offer of affection. Or all of those things.

“It’s warm enough in here,” said Childermass, because it was, and he could think his own dream into the middle of July if he wanted to.

Norrell started to say something plaintive and far too coherent about the weather, so Childermass pulled him on top so that they were warm and tight together. As he’d thought, as soon as Norrell got something against his cock he was too faint with pleasure to worry about any thing, so Childermass settled to stroking everything he could reach until Norrell sobbed and came, far too fast as usual.

_“Most_ curious,” said Norrell after a few moments, in a tone that suggested something had awoken his inner scholar.

“What is it now?” said Childermass, doing his best for patience and hoping that his tendency to realism wasn’t frustrating his every endeavour.

“Even though I’ve, ah, _finished,_ the dream doesn’t appear to be waking me up to send me back.”

“Is that because it’s my dream?” said Childermass, but then he noticed something odd about Norrell’s experience on his own account, especially because Norrell hadn’t stopped moving. “It makes you spend like a woman…well, that _is_ convenient!” And had to explain to Norrell, who was innocent of women, that he was not trying to be insulting, it was a matter of the expression of vital spirits being different in a man’s case. Considering how little reciprocation Childermass had had, he rather thought he’d have settled for his partner being awake, but the feel of Norrell still on top of him, quite as hard and interested as before, was having a thoroughly delightful effect, even when Norrell stopped going at him and started asking daft questions about was he doing it right and could Childermass please adjust their position if he had any ideas about achieving it to best effect.

Childermass had to kiss him quite hard to shut him up, and Mr Norrell squeaked into his mouth as if this were somewhat surprising. Childermass supposed it was: _pace_ any attempts at flirtation Childermass had managed using the word ’tongue’, this was almost certainly the first time anyone had _actually_ snogged him. Inexpertly but with real enthusiasm, Norrell kissed back, and had to keep stopping to gasp for breath between tongue-stabbing him because he was so caught up in it. Then he pulled back, and looked at Childermass quite seriously. “Does it trouble you, John…that I have not the slightest idea what I’m doing?”

Childermass smiled at him, and said, “No, not much!”

“Why?” said Norrell. “Any other human endeavour is best learned before doing it. Do you have any idea how long I laboured over my books before I cast my first spell?” 

“Knowing you, probably. You would have done quite a bit of book-fondling before committing yourself to action,” said Childermass. “Try imagining I’m a first edition.”

Mr Norrell looked him shyly in the face, as if checking whether he was making fun or not, so Childermass added, “I’m only teasing a little. I was used to enjoying watching you wi’ the books, warmed you through nicely sometimes, and I liked thinking of you curling up next to me.”

Then Norrell _did_ touch him, shaking a little and looking as if he was trying to work out whether it was a good idea or not, but looking as if he was concentrating intently. Childermass had had affairs before, but had never felt someone was trying to catalogue him. Hands and face first, presumably where Norrell had felt able to look but never felt he had the right to touch.

Norrell’s fingers were dry, delicate, inquiring, and Childermass opened his mouth and sucked one, which made Norrell squeak again. “If you get it wet, feels better,” explained Childermass, and Norrell inexpertly sucked at his own fingers before tracing them down the back of Childermass’s neck. “Do people do that?” Norrell asked.

“I think you just did,” said Childermass, shivering a little.

“Can I—“ said Norrell, watching Childermass’s face, “—all right, is that too many questions?” Apparently despite the awkwardness, he really didn’t want to stop, because he began to attend to different parts of Childermass’s body, this time reaching for the parts that were normally covered by clothes. He seemed fascinated by the way Childermass was longer, more muscular than himself, and settled to stroking everything above the waist, while Childermass moved rather restlessly.

Norrell butted his head in again and kissed and licked at his shoulder: evidently as long as he could hide his face he found it easier to express himself.

Childermass sighed, and pulled them both further up in the bed. “Come on then, you are allowed to touch me more than that. It’d be unfair if you didn’t.”

“What if I’m…very bad?” said Norrell, in a near-whisper.

“Then I shall have to teach you,” Childermass said, as patiently as he could manage, and hissed a breath of sudden excitement as he felt Norrell lay a hand on his thigh, trembling slightly, and draw it upwards. “Although I daresay you won’t need to be very _good,_ state I’m in by now.” That appeared to unlock Norrell’s nervous tension, as he began to use both his hands on Childermass’s prick. It was, as threatened, hardly an expert performance; Norrell had forgotten about getting his hands wet first, and was barely managing a rhythm, as well as not realising that he didn’t have to be gentle by now, but Childermass led by example and squeezed Norrell’s hands on himself hard enough to do the trick nicely.

He lay there, panting and almost glowing from the heat and relief of it, then Norrell was on top of him, butting his head between Childermass’s neck and shoulder and imperiously demanding more, only a moment later.

Childermass sighed, and said, “Can’t we settle down and have a bit of afterglow first?”

“I need you _now!”_ said Norrell, so Childermass managed another, more long-suffering sigh, and said, “Of course you do, you inconvenient little sod,” and was surprised to see Norrell look at him to check he was only teazing. “You’re _my_ inconvenient little sod,” he added. “I should be bloody used to it by this time. Go ahead, but you’ll have to do all the work.”

They settled down with Norrell clamping both his thighs around one of Childermass’s and rubbing furiously, with little sobs of pleasure as he came. He evidently hadn’t been exaggerating when he said that he had a taste for Childermass’s long muscular legs.

Childermass wondered how he could have missed it. Sometimes Norrell had used to get up in the dead of night to see him off, or see him return, on horseback. He’d thought at the time, why didn’t Norrell trust him to go and get the right books, but evidently that hadn’t been his only motivation.

“Happy now?” said Childermass, yawning.

“Mm,” said Norrell, yawning himself. “Can I have another go?”

“Surely _even you_ can’t be such a slut as to be desperate again already?” said Childermass, fondling him and discovering quite a creditable cock-stand, particularly for a man who’d just come twice. Norrell blushed all over, and wriggled, and muttered that he didn’t _need_ it, just _wanted_ it, so Childermass just frigged him gently until he sighed and spilled, marvelling again at how convenient dream-sex was, not to have to move away from over-sensitive parts. What a wonder it was to have no experience to draw from! He himself couldn’t convince his prick to behave in an unrealistic fashion, but evidently Norrell’s almost total lack of sexual experience was a positive boon in the dreamworld: he could do anything he could imagine. Evidently he’d been imagining.

Which thought had Childermass himself pretty-much at half-mast for another turn, realistic or not, so he pulled Norrell into his arms, all warm and rumpled and _nearly_ complaining at being interrupted in his own afterglow, and started working himself up for it. By this time, now Norrell had lost a few of his earlier inhibitions, he really seemed actually _eager_ to handle Childermass. He was apparently fascinated by the difference in size between them, and how dark and thick Childermass’s prick seemed in his own white hands, judging by how he kept squeezing and sighing and admiring him.

“How do you like it?” Norrell asked, so Childermass admitted that he wasn’t sure if Norrell could manage going at it quite hard, the way he liked if he was really desperate, and Norrell shyly asked if Childermass could show him. “Let’s both do it,” he suggested, which ended up with Norrell’s dainty little hands stroking and prodding impudently and doing the most delicious things to Childermass’s balls while he himself took care of the business end, using a nice dribble of oil from the bottle next to the bed and squeezing until it almost hurt.

He nearly got it in the face; not entirely sure whether that was enthusiasm or lack of realism. Opening one eye, he noticed that Norrell had apparently come all over the bed, quite untouched and sobbing for breath, from sheer excitement.

“You do _realise_ that’s probably impossible,” he said, in the interests of accuracy.

“ _Imagine_ how little I care,” said Norrell, still panting.

“As long as you don’t think that’s how people usually do it,” said Childermass, and yawned, his exhausted and over-sensitive cock reminding him of the likely aftermath of a thorough orgasm.

Norrell sighed. “I doubt I will get much chance to observe how people _usually_ do it, considering where I am. Will be, when I wake up. I wanted something to remember.” He yawned hugely, and fell against Childermass again, butting his face in against his shoulder again.

Childermass sighed. He felt Norrell’s hard little chin and hot face against him and slid an arm round him, wishing they’d had a chance to do this _really._ Norrell lifted up his head enough to mutter something about never being able to sleep with someone else in the room, it was always so awkward, dropt his face again, and went to sleep. 

When Childermass woke up—really woke up—he was alone in the bed, and wished he wasn’t.

 

 

[1](%E2%80%9C#foot1t%E2%80%9D) Among other things, including insects, animals, people, forests, ridicule, liking the wrong things, and book damage. Although he was probably still bothered about that last thing; he’d need to be a different person entirely not to worry about that.

[2](%E2%80%9C#foot2t%E2%80%9D) Latin, lit.: “one who does everything”.

[3](%E2%80%9C#foot3t%E2%80%9D) A thing that had happened to him several times during his life, retired as it was. He found it difficult to learn that one of the ways not to be laughed at is not to care about it _quite_ so much.

[ 4](%E2%80%9C#foot4t%E2%80%9D) _Prufrock._ Yes, Eliot is out of period. Bite me. (It's the querulous tone of voice that made me think of it)

[ 5](%E2%80%9C#foot5t%E2%80%9D)It would certainly have been easier than some of the impossibly-conflicting domestic tasks Norrell had favoured him with instead.

[6](%E2%80%9C#foot6t%E2%80%9D)Wykeston (pronounced: ‘Wixton’), _The Magic and Magicians of Venerye._ Childermass was mildly surprized that there was only one book on magic applied to carnal affairs in the library at Hurtfew, and mildly amused that it was shelved next to six books about deer-hunting: what did that say about relative priorities in the lives of magicians?

[ 7](%E2%80%9C#foot7t%E2%80%9D)He was quite right on this point. One would have thought that he would be popular with booksellers because he had deep enough pockets, but what with the pestering, the putting out of good customers as Norrell went over their heads to obtain books they had requested, and his sometimes failing to buy books he had specially ordered if they didn’t meet his exacting standards, a surprizing quantity of booksellers had him filed under More Trouble Than He’s Worth. Not that they didn’t take his money, of course, but they certainly didn’t feel much personal loyalty in it.

[8](%E2%80%9C#foot8t%E2%80%9D)Norrell was a firm believer in the idea that if you can’t say something dreadful there’s no point in saying anything at all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (Please tell me someone got the joke about deer-hunting. It made me laugh, but explaining it would ruin it)


	3. Chapter 3

Gilbert Norrell looked…different, Jonathan Strange decided, when his difficult friend woke up in the Darkness. Maybe slightly younger, maybe slightly happier: no wonder that looked odd on him!

Norrell rubbed his eyes and admitted to a dream.

“I hope it was a pleasant dream, sir,” said Strange, agreeably.

“I shall never malign the Raven King for the rest of my life….what are you doing?”

“Looking for a mark of enchantment. I don’t entirely trust you not to be moss-oak!”

Mr Norrell had a few sharp things to say about Jonathan forgetting how to test for such enchantments, but he still didn’t stop smiling for some time afterwards.

A while later, Mr Norrell helped him with a few refinements to the ‘water like glass’ spell they’d been working on for Jonathan to talk to Arabella. With a little adjustment, the water held its place for a while so that it was much easier to see into, without impurities or waves, and conversation became (if a little distorted) oddly possible. Arabella told him that it was all very well telling her not to be a widow and striking a noble attitude, but if they could talk she would quite like to. What with the war, and the enchantment, and being a magician, she felt he rather owed her arrears of conversation from when she was more conventionally his wife! “Bell, I have missed you!” he said. He looked for Mr Norrell to see he wasn’t bothering him, but Mr Norrell had retreated into a distant corner with a book, so Jonathan and Arabella just talked for a while, quite the way they were used to.

The really odd thing was that Mr Norrell started using the same spell, after a while. Strange had absolutely no idea who he’d be talking to. Once Strange came into Norrell’s part of the room when he was starting to use it and Norrell flapped and flustered and muttered at him until he went away, though Norrell had never shewn any romantic inclinations all the time he’d known him, and he could not imagine precisely what Norrell had left to want that wasn’t in his precious library. 

When Norrell joined him later, he looked very flushed, and even more than normally untidy. 

“Are you well, sir?” asked Strange. He always found it an appalling nuisance when Norrell took a chill, especially having to try to find him hot water and handkerchiefs every so often.

“Quite well,” said Norrell, “and rather relieved that d——d spell from Wykeston appears to have come loose!” he added in an undertone.

“Wykeston? I’m not familiar…”

“It is a _very bad_ book, sir. A _wretched_ book,” said Norrell, severely.

“Really?” said Strange, feeling rather interested.

Norrell sighed. “ _Actually_ bad, not the ‘ninety-eight per-cent of English magic is wrong’ that was my previous position. Would you like to learn something better? Freshly-invented in England?”

He really had changed, Strange thought, as Mr Norrell started to teach him the rudiments of an entirely new spell that had apparently been created by a housemaid-magician in London, which would provide them with plentiful hot water as necessary. He had to admit that although he hadn’t given a single thought to hot water when they were surrounded by servants in England, this had a lot to offer in comfort in unusual conditions. He was sure it might have been a lot of help in the War, except that the conditions of ‘filthy’ and ‘not in immediate danger’ had rarely intersected except at night when he was too tired to do much spell-work.

Then Norrell went to add it to his main research notebook, the one entitled _Scholarly Appendix to the Works of Sutton-Grove, with Additional Findings and Cross-Headings,_ because Norrell hadn’t changed quite so much as all that.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm afraid I don't have a tragic muse, at all. So when neveralarch said the pairing was "super tragic" and I wanted to see how I could make it happier, apparently the best my incurably light-minded muse could come up with was "phone sex and thaumaturgical geeking". Oops.


End file.
